Epilogue Two

It had been a complete up hill battle, but Zelda was finally in a place where she wanted to be. It was a long time in the making, over a hundred years and all it took was the fall of Hyrule for Zelda to discover what she really wanted to do with her life. To some, it may have seemed like a no brainer, but all Zelda wanted to do was travel. She wanted to see Hyrule more in-depth. Explore everywhere, and even travel beyond, but her title and duties of being the princess always pulled her back. Now, there was no royal family, there was no princess, Zelda was just Zelda.

Zelda was completely selfish when it came to Link. After he was healed and ready to travel again, Zelda instantly relieved him of his duties as her Appointed Knight. There was a slither of selfish desire, that Zelda hoped Link would still want to stay with her, and protect her. To no one's surprise, Link said no.

"Zelda, I would follow you to the ends of the world." He had started. "You have always been more than my charge—I love you."

The confession had made Zelda tear up. "But what if I'm not the same Zelda as before."

"That doesn't matter." Link had said fiercely and pulled Zelda into a hug.

After spending a week in Kakariko Village, the Heroes of Hyrule, left and headed towards Hateno Village, where they could completely rest for the next few weeks, and decide what they wanted to do.

When riding through the Ash Swamp, Link tensed up in the horse he was riding. As it happened, Zelda managed to catch a few horses in while she was preparing herself to face Ganon. One of the horses she had caught was a brown mare, with four white socks. Link could swear it was Epona. The horse certainly looked like his old horse, he knew it would have been impossible though, his horse would have suffered just how the other horses had, one hundred years ago.

As Link closed his eyes, he could see the events that happened one hundred years ago pass through his mind, like it was only yesterday. He painfully pulled his horse, Apollo, to a halt as Link saw the princess fall one hundred years ago. Despite what people had said, Zelda, Impa and even Purah, it wasn't his fault what happened all those years ago, but somewhere deep down, Link knew if he was stronger and better, the whole fiasco could have been avoided. And more importantly, Zelda wouldn't be hurt.

Link couldn't imagine not having all of his memories, it would be painful no knowing who you were and who people were. For Zelda, she was back to square one. Link knew she had recovered a huge portions of her memories, but it's all the small memories that he feels the guilt the most.

The next few weeks are spent in peace in Hateno Village. Most of the villagers where happy to see Zelda riding back through the village, but were more intrigued when they realised Zelda was being followed closely behind by someone. They call came crowding around Zelda. Link's eyes narrowed out of habit, and was looking around to determine if there was any threat around. Satisfied, Link slowly lowered his guard and smiled and some of the younger children of the village as they looked in awe at the sword strapped to his back.

The following days, saw Link and Zelda mostly sleeping. Another huge debate had broken out over who should take the bed.

"Link!" Zelda called out. "You must! You've been fighting Ganon for over one hundred years! Not only that, but you are my guest!"

"It's completely improper Princess." Link frowned back at Zelda. "I'm more than comfortable to take a bed roll and sleep downstairs."

Ever since the pair had been reunited, Link had slipped comfortably slipped back into the roll of appointed knight. Even though Zelda had relieved him of his duty, Link still carried on as Zelda didn't say anything. He was polite and chivalrous to a fault, he had yet to over step any boundaries. And refused to either call Zelda, by her first name, or see both himself and Zelda as equals.

It never sat well with Zelda when Link would refer to her as the princess or rant on about formalities, when in this time, titles and formalities meant nothing. It had taken Zelda long enough to convince Link that he could speak freely, and not be in a self-imposed silence. Link eventually moved away from Zelda and made his way downstairs, grabbing the bedroll on his way down.

Later in the night, Link was awoken by screaming coming from the bed up in the loft. Thinking the worse, Link was up out of his own bed and running up the stairs with the Master Sword in hand. He looked and there appeared to be no threat, but looking at Zelda, Link realised she was having a nightmare. Link knew how unpleasant they were. He's always had flashes of visions (which often grew into nightmares), mostly people who looked exactly like him, but normally dressed in green, he knew they were the heroes of the past, and he would often watch them through their own journey and watch them take down an evil, time and time again. Although now, he had nightmares about Ganon, all the possibilities that could have happened, each was just as bad as the other.

Link was quiet in walking up to the princess.

"Zelda," he muttered quietly. There was no response. "Zelda," Link said again, a little more firmly this time.

It was enough to wake the princess from her sleep. Zelda slowly opened her eyes and looked at Link.

"Oh," Zelda said quite embarrassed. "I didn't mean to wake you."

"It doesn't matter." Link dismissed. "Are you ok?"

"I think I am now." Zelda looked Link in the eyes. Link adverted his eyes, and turned to leave. "Can you please stay?"

Link turned back around and saw the princess pleading with her eyes. Never in his life had he ever seen her so vulnerable. It broke his heart. Before he could even think about anything, he was making his way back to the bed and hopping in next to her.

"Of course." Link muttered to Zelda as she started to doze off again.

Link and Zelda had travelled through most of Hyrule. Link was quite upset when he was both in Zora's Domain and Gorons City. The memories he had there were all but bittersweet. They were filled with his friends, namely, Mipha and Daruk. Knowing the champions where well and truly gone, made Link very upset. The guilt he had tried to suppress, came straight back in full force. Link refused to speak for a solid week and a half.

It wasn't until Zelda shared her own fears and regrets that Link snapped out of his own self-imposed silence.

"It's not just you that feels the guilt." Zelda told Link with tears down her face.

"You hold no fault in this. It's my own." Link fired back. "I've told you once before, and I will tell you again, no one blames you over what happened one hundred years ago, so you shouldn't blame yourself."

Things were now rocky between the two heroes to say the least. Both were walking on egg shells around each other, either one wanted to say anything that could set the other off. It was hard. After all of Zelda's attempts to make Link more comfortable and prove he was her equal were shattered.

Link had reverted back to how he was before the Calamity. It drove Zelda absolutely mad. She had snapped at Link more than what necessary. Link would still say nothing, playing the role of the appointed knight extremely well. The only thing Zelda could tell that was different, was a far-off look in Link's eyes, like he was deep in thought. Deep enough in thought, that Link very rarely reacted to anything, except things that posed a threat to Zelda's safety, it was like a switch came on in Link, and he often sprung into action. Whether if it was a stray monster, or a villager who had gotten a little too close for Link's liking.

Zelda was tried of it all, she had told Link that much. Zelda thought they had grown from the knight and princess relationship, to something more, but it seemed Zelda was wrong. It was a situation that was happening far too often for Zelda's liking. She didn't like to be wrong, she loved to be right.

"Why are you like this?!" Zelda exclaimed at Link after he stared down a villager, whose glance landed on Zelda for one-second too much.

"Your safety is the uttermost importance, princess." Link replied, without turning to make eye contact with Zelda.

"There is no danger!" Zelda hopped of her horse and turned and stormed off in the direction of her house.

Link said nothing as he hopped of his own horse and lead both horses through Hateno where Zelda's house was. In the small stables off to the side of Zelda's house, Link was taking the saddles off the horses and combing through their manes.

"I hope she realises I mean well." Link said as he brushed Nay's mane. "I was the reason of her downfall one hundred years ago, there is no escaping that. I just don't want anything to happen to her."

"You know that's not true." Link was very rarely startled, he pride himself on his ability to know what was happening around him. But in the recent few months, Zelda had managed to catch him of guard. Link let out a little yelp as he jumped and dropped the brush from his hands.

"Zelda," Her name rolled off his tongue as he turned to face her. "How much of that did you hear?"

"Enough," Zelda walked up and gently wrapped her arms around Link. "You need to know that you aren't at fault. No one is." Zelda's grip tightened around her knight. "If there would be someone to blame, it would be Ganon."

After the afternoon in the stables, things between Link and Zelda got better. It had been a lengthy conversation between the pair, but a much needed one. Zelda assured Link that it wasn't his fault, like he had done to her. Link felt better because of it. It had came as a complete help when they had visited Zora Domain again, and Link was assured that the Zora people held no blame towards Link.

In fact, Link was quick to make friends with the Zora Prince, Sidon. As the pair's friendship grew, they would often disappear from both Zora Domain and Hateno Village. There was one incident where the pair had left for three whole weeks before they finally returned. When they did return, Link had a wide grin on his face and Sidon's grin was even bigger.

"Did something happen while you were gone?" Zelda asked when she saw the pair walking into Zora's Domain.

"No," Link replied. Zelda was suspicious, she came even more suspicious when Sidon nudged Link, something defiantly happened.

A few days had passed since Link had returned from his trip with Sidon. And now Zelda and Link were sitting in their home in Hateno, eating a dinner that Link had skilfully prepared for them.

"I constantly forget how much of a good cook you are!" Zelda exclaimed as she shoved a spoonful of rice in her mouth.

Link nodded and painfully swallowed his own mouthful. He felt hot all over and was internally shaking. This had to be the scariest moment of his life. He would rather face Ganon a hundred more times than ask the simple question that was burning on the tip of his tongue.

"Zelda," Link turned to speak. "You know I love you right?"

"Of course, and I love you back." She smiled at Link, wondering where this conversation was going. "Why do you ask?"

Link placed his knife and fork down and reached into his pocket and pulled out a small leather pouch. "I just wanted to make sure before I gave you this." Link reached into the little pouch and pulled out a golden ring with a small simple diamond in the middle.

Zelda's eyes started to water and she placed her hand over her mouth and a wide grin spread across her face.

"Zelda, I know I'm not good—"

"Yes!" Zelda interrupted Link. "Of course I will marry you!"

Link sighed in relief and walked over to Zelda and put the ring on her finger. When he had done, he tilted his head back up to met Zelda's eyes.

"I love you." Zelda muttered before she pulled Link in for a kiss.

A/N: Here it is! The last part of the story! I can't believe that I've made it this far! I know I said in the last chapter that it would only be a week or so before the final part was up, sorry. I have left it on a little bit of a cliffhanger, but I might write a few one shots after this, but I have a few other things I want to finish and I would really like to edit this story a little bit more.

Although I've got to say, I'm a little conflicted about this ending, maybe because it was left on a cliffhanger, or maybe because I've rushed it? I would love to hear what you think about it!

Also, I just want your opinion, should Zelda rebuild the monarchy or should she and Link live the simple life in Hateno? I've always loved both ideas, I just want to see what you think they should do.